


Coda

by YigaClan



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:40:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21866872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YigaClan/pseuds/YigaClan
Summary: How each of Hyrule's Champions met their end.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 16





	1. Chapter 1

You didn't stand a chance from the beginning.

You're intelligent. You deeply understand Vah Ruta's inner workings, and that made her chambers and halls easier to navigate. But no amount of understanding could have prepared you for this.

Your trident feels like a toothpick in your hands. The walls pulsate with a sickening,  _ evil  _ energy, and it sinks in that this is not the Vah Ruta you know. 

_ For my people. For my brother, for my father. For him.  _

You can't be afraid, can't allow yourself the surrender of fear. But after you've sliced your way through black roiling mire and corrupted machinery, you see it, and the fear takes hold of you against your will. It stares back at you with one eye which locks onto you, and every bone in your body instantly turns to jelly as your feet slip in the few inches of cold water. The beast  _ screams  _ and the sound makes your knees buckle, sends bile burning into your throat.

Something remarkable happens, then. Your hands tighten on the Lightscale and in a twisted mirror image, it seems to ready itself in the same way. 

You have been quiet all your life. Demure laughter, soft spoken words, patience and smooth rivers of understanding.

But the moment you plant your trident into the floor and right yourself on your feet again, you stop being quiet. You think of them and the calamity that has already taken so many in just a few hours and the  _ audacity  _ it has to look you in the eyes and try and take everything from you--

And you scream back. 

The fight doesn't last long. It knows your weaknesses, has the upper hand and takes advantage of what you aren't expecting. You're still seething when the light-razor edge of its spear pierces your shoulder and sends you flying backward until you hit the far wall.

The last thing you see, floating on your back in the water, is blue light blurred by hot tears.


	2. Chapter 2

The danger of your arrogance is a lesson learned far too late. You wouldn't say you've taken any of this lightly, but you hadn't really expected it to come to this, either. You'd trained, prepared, fine-tuned, all in the event that it  _ might  _ happen (it wouldn't).

But it did. And it is, and so you face it head on like everything else you do. 

It helps to puff yourself up a bit. You squawk out a few taunting comments,  _ come on, this can't be all you've got,  _ loosing arrow after whistling arrow at anything unfortunate enough to have crossed your path. Things seem to be going surprisingly well.

But by the time you reach the final terminal, you're already injured and, admittedly, slightly worse for wear. Vah Medoh gives a groan and a lurch, tilting her titanic wings as if trying to shake off an irksome insect. 

That's when you see it.

It appears seemingly from the ether. You get ready to nock an arrow but the motion is cut off halfway; before you can even reach for your quiver you're being sent spiraling by a vicious gust of wind. 

It wins by tiring you out, a dirty strategy. You can't predict a single thing it does. Just when you think you've got the pattern down, the damn thing switches it up and you're on your toes the entire way until you're not, just a bit too slow. As you whip around to face where it's appeared behind you, time winds down to a crawl.

You remember a thousand things in the millisecond it takes for the projectile to collide with your chest and then you see the sky--bloody clouds churning in the vastness--and on your descent, falling through the same empty air over which you'd reigned, your last act in life is a tired smirk as Vah Medoh gets smaller and smaller in your vision.  _ This isn't over.  _


	3. Chapter 3

Brotherhood is more important to you than most things; it is a common belief among your people, but you are their leader largely because you value this above all else. 

You are alone when you step into Vah Rudania.

Not truly, you tell yourself. They're fighting alongside you, even if they aren't physically with you. This is the thought that grounds you as you feel for the walls in blind darkness, making your way through the choking ash of malice until you bump into the main terminal. 

You worry about them the entire time. Link is capable, Zelda is brave, Revali is masterful, Urbosa is quick, Mipha is smart. You know this, and yet your gut (which has never been wrong before) tells you that something  _ horrible  _ has happened. 

It's at the same moment you have this thought that you enter the familiar open-air chamber to finish the job, and something is definitely off. Not in the same way this whole place feels off. 

He's an ugly bastard to be sure, and twice as strong. You feel confident, but this...thing...is nothing to mess around with. You get a couple good hits in, too, and you're even grinning as you whirl around and slam Boulder Breaker right into its face. 

It manages to reorient itself after a moment, and that's when things quickly take a turn for the worst.

Your barrier, tough as it may be, isn't quite tough enough for the blow that shatters it on contact and comes down on top of you. You don't have enough time to defend, and it uses this opening to beat you into the ground over and over until your ears ring and your vision fills with blood. 

You're still thinking of them when it ends.


End file.
